MARIOS SCHWAB AUTUMN/WINTER 2015-16 READY-TO-WEAR LONDON
EACH Fashion Week there’s a similar qualm – that the schedule is a little too on the tightly-packed side. The answer, then, is to get in there before everyone else and go your own way – which is just what Marios Schwab did this season, hosting a salon-style presentation a good two weeks prior to the beginning of the London Fashion Week madness.
“It’s more personal, not quite so rabbit-caught-in-the-headlights,” he said, surrounded by sketchbooks on the floor and moodboard imagery providing the backdrop to a suite in the Café Royal Hotel.
And with this the designer brought up two questions to answer: his take on autumn/winter 2015, plus is showing like this the way forward? Throughout the day the consensus from everyone in attendance seemed to be yes. Sit back, relax and hear the designer gently talk us through the collection; picking out his favourite pieces, styling them just so on the model – so she sits and walks to show that the skirt, though voluminous, can still facilitate daily life as well as its more elegant elements; and undoes the jewellery-style belt to show both what it does and doesn’t bring to the dress; show the wearer she has options.
For Schwab, this sort of set-up worked. His princess dresses, all gypsy skirts and coral vein embroidery to represent the nerves of the body (and they were depicted in their exact position also); his rich vermilion colour palette; his buttons with an intricate story behind them; his book about Man Ray as reference could otherwise get lost. Of course, if everyone did it this way, we might have to think again.
Jessica Bumpus